Peter J. Crotty, Democratic Force In Western New York, Dies at 82

By SAM ROBERTS

Published: March 4, 1992

Peter J. Crotty, the erudite king-maker who dominated Democratic politics in western New York as the party chairman of Erie County and was a force in the campaigns of John F. Kennedy for President and Robert F. Kennedy for the United States Senate, died yesterday at Mercy Hospital in Buffalo. He was 82 years old and lived in Buffalo.

He died of a heart attack, his son James said.

Mr. Crotty was elected president of the Buffalo City Council in 1947, but he was far more successful in elevating other candidates. He was also the patriarch of a dynasty of public servants, including Gerald C. Crotty, who resigned last year as Gov. Mario M. Cuomo's chief of staff, and Paul A. Crotty, a former New York City finance and housing commissioner.

"They are an Irish clan in the most complete sense of the word," said Timothy J. Russert, former counselor to Mr. Cuomo and now an NBC executive, who was Gerald Crotty's high school classmate. Son of Irish Immigrants

Peter J. Crotty was born and raised in Buffalo, the son of Irish immigrants. His father was a longshoreman. Mr. Crotty worked his way through Canisius College and the University of Buffalo Law School by sorting mail at night at the Buffalo Post Office. After he graduated, he began his government career as a lawyer for the National Labor Relations Board in Buffalo during the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt.

In 1945, he formed a law firm, McMahon & Crotty, and represented, among others, locals of the steelworkers, teamsters, longshoremen and carpenters in western New York. He continued to practice law until his death and was also a member of the Statler Foundation, which awards grants to schools and students pursuing careers in the hotel and restaurant industry.

After serving as Council President until 1951, he ran unsuccessfully for Mayor of Buffalo in 1953. Five years later, he was nominated for Attorney General on the slate topped by Gov. W. Averell Harriman, but lost in the Rockefeller landslide to Louis J. Lefkowitz.

His greatest political success was not as a candidate though, but in orchestrating campaigns for others as the Erie County Democratic chairman from 1954 to 1965. One of those was John F. Kennedy, for whom he helped swing the New York delegation. The next spring, he was invited to the White House in what was widely viewed as the President's anointment of Mr. Crotty as Democratic state chairman. Bridged Boss Rule and Reform

Mr. Crotty, said Richard Wade, a professor of urban history at the City University of New York Graduate Center, "was a bridge between the old days of boss rule in the Democratic Party in New York and the emergence of reform."

As a boss, he was never fully embraced by the party's reform faction, although he subsequently reconciled with the wing of the party led by Mayor Robert F. Wagner in New York City, and was a pivotal player in delivering the Senate nomination to Robert F. Kennedy in 1964 and the gubernatorial nomination to Hugh L. Carey in 1974. He was elected as a delegate pledged to Senator George McGovern at the 1972 Democratic national convention.

In 1965, Mr. Crotty retired as county chairman. He was succeeded by a protege, Joseph F. Crangle, with whom he also frequently feuded. His expected Federal appointment to a judgeship or ambassadorship never materialized.

But the public careers of his children contributed to his legacy. In addition to Gerald, who was Mr. Cuomo's counsel and secretary and is now a vice president of the ITT Corporation, and Paul, who returned to private practice in Manhattan after serving in the Koch administration, another son, Peter, was a counsel to two state agencies and still another, James, a lawyer, unsuccessfully sought the Erie County Democratic chairmanship in 1978.

Mr. Crotty is survived by his wife of 52 years, Margaret McMahon Crotty; six sons, Peter and Gerald of Albany; Paul, Robert and Kevin of New York City and James of Buffalo; a daughter, Mary Jo Shapiro of New York City, and 25 grandchildren.